Read Zero at the Bone for Free Online

one’s better,” he said, pointing to a Buick sedan a few cars down.
    D hesitated. “Why?”
    “The tags are six months expired. I don’t think anyone’s driving it at all.” The HAL lenses rested on Jack’s face for a beat, and then D nodded. “All right,” was all he said, but Jack detected (or hoped he detected) a note of admiration for Jack’s deduction. Maybe I could be a ninja assassin too, Jack thought.
    D took a Swiss Army knife out of his pocket, crouched by the Buick, and had the plates off in a few quick twists, then went around to the front and repeated the procedure.
    They went back to Jack’s car and D swapped out the plates, carefully peeling Jack’s current registration tags off his plates and putting them on the stolen ones, then tossed Jack’s plates in the trunk. “Shouldn’t we put those on the Buick?” Jack asked.
    D looked at him like he was crazy. “Why’n hell would we do that?”
    “Well… no one would notice wrong plates on the Buick, but no plates might stick out.”
    “Look round,” D said, impatiently. “Folks don’t come back here much; by the time anyone sees we be long gone. Besides, we put yer plates on this car, if it gets reported they’ll know we was here, and they’ll know what plates we got!” Jack nodded, feeling like he deserved that particular dumbass. “Right. Sure.” Back in the car, he said nothing as D drove out of town. As they put Vegas in their rearview mirror, the adrenaline began to leave Jack’s body and he slumped against the passenger door, his head aching and his muscles twitching. In the past few hours he’d gone from the safe (albeit dull) life of a protected witness to being on the lam with a man who’d come to his house to kill him. A man who, it seemed, had decided not to kill him but couldn’t be bothered to actually talk to him. It yanked all the moorings out from beneath his feet when he could see no more of his future than he could of the highway ahead. “Where are we going?” he finally asked.
    “Quartzsite,” D replied
    That was about a four-hour drive to the middle of nowhere. “What’s there?” Sigh. “Gotta pick up some stuff.” He sounded put out to have to answer even this simplest of questions, and pique rose in Jack’s throat.
    “You know, you could cut me some fucking slack,” he snapped. D glanced at him briefly, then back at the road. “I am stuck in a car with some guy who was supposed to kill me and this is the second time in as many months that my whole life’s been pureed and I’m just supposed to sit here quietly and not ask any questions? I’m real fucking sorry to bother you, but I’m the one with a bull’s-eye on his forehead here.” Jack crossed his arms over his chest and flopped back against the seat.
    D’s visible response to this little tirade was to purse his lips slightly. Jack watched out of the corner of his eye as the man’s jaw clenched and unclenched. Suddenly, he yanked the wheel to the right and pulled off the deserted highway, then parked the car 18 | Jane Seville

    and turned in his seat to face Jack, taking off those damned HAL sunglasses.
    “Dominguez brothers want ya dead. I was hired ta kill ya. I cain’t be entirely sure was them that hired me. So that’s possibly two parties after ya. Plus the U.S. Marshals gonna be on the hunt for ya now that yer outta pocket. That’s three parties we gotta steer clear of.”
    “Why can’t we let the Marshals catch us? If you’re so worried about my welfare, they’re the ones—”
    D cut him off. “Hate ta tell ya, but we gotta consider that whoever put out the hit on ya got yer location from inside the program.”
    Jack blinked. That was a disturbing thought. “How could they—” D flapped a hand as if this were an insignificant detail. “Bought, stole, hacked, blackmailed. Don’t matter. Point is, cain’t trust ’em no more ta hide ya. Plus, since I ain’t done ya, parties what hired me, be they the brothers or not,